WHAT'S ON IN LONDON DURING CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR?
New Year's Eve Celebrations, 31 January The beginning of 2007 will be brought in with a fantastic firework display along the River Thames in front of the London Eye. Best place to see all the action is along the Victoria Embankment between Westminster bridge and Blackfriars.
New Year's Day Parade, 1 January Thousands of performers from all around the world will be taking part in London's spectacular annual New Year's Day Parade. This year The Pa rade celebrates its 21st Anniversary of bringing extraordinary entertainment to thousands of people. It will start at 1200 at Parliament Square, Westminster and finish at Green Park. www.londonparade.co.uk/event/
Transport Disruptions A list of planned station closures and track closures for the next six months is now available in PDF format. For this and further information on travel in London go to: www.tfl.gov.uk
To the top of the pageEVENTS AROUND EUROPE :
AER LINGUS has announced it will leave the One World grouping on 1st April, 2007, so no BA Miles from them after that date. Recently Aer Lingus came on the market and there were gasps of horror when Michael O’Leary, owner of Ryanair said he was interested.
HEATHROW: September saw completion of the Main shell of Terminal 5A, allowing the start of outfitting the infrastructure. The rail shuttle between T5A and T5B is in place and operative, and already some aircraft are being parked at the new terminal at busy times. If you are out that way there is a display in the information centre between T1,2 &3 and T4.
MILLENIUM DOME: Now called the O2 will open in July, 2007 after a £600 million investment. It has been remodelled as an entertainment venue containing:- a club with a capacity of 2,000 featuring live music, 11 cinema screens and various meeting and exhibition areas. There is also a 23,000 capacity sports and entertainment stadium. Supported by bars and restaurants the venue will host the Artistic Gymnastics World Championships in 2009 and in 2012 will hold the Gymnastics and Basketball finals for the Olympics. It is owned by Anschutz Entertainment Group.
MIND THE GAP! Ever wondered why they say that, well, figures have been released for the last 5 years that show 800 people fell between the train and the platform. An excess of alcohol is blamed for part of claims totalling £500 million (€750 million) for the 12,000 people injured, which includes 7,000 going up and down to platforms. Most bizarre – 72 people coming into stationary objects, 17 hit by flying objects, 10 bitten by insects, dogs or fellow travellers and 800 trapped in equipment such as closing doors. Waterloo and King’s Cross saw the highest numbers.
GOONHILLY EARTH STATION in Cornwall beamed the first trans-Atlantic TV programme in 1967 featuring the Beatles and received the first Telstar satellite signals. Now the owner, BT (British Telecom), is closing down as it is no longer viable.
EMERGENCY SERVICES: 24 hour walk-in medical services can now be found around Europe, here are some I know, please let us have details of any others you may have used.
Dublin: Clare Street Medical Centre. 26 Clare St, Dublin 2. Tel: (01) 6625050 Mobile 087 7418330
London: Medicentre, several branches in London, one at Victoria Station, near the toilets. Call 0870 600 0870 for the nearest clinic. Hours vary. www.medicentre.co.uk
Luzern: Located in the underground concourse of the Lucerne Railway Station, veering left from the escalators towards KKL is the PERMANANCE MEDICAL CENTRE.
Oslo: Oslo Akutten, Nedre Vollgate 8, ph 2241 1440, central.
Stockholm: Cityakuten, Apellbergsgatan 48, ph 412 2960. Near the Concert Hall
GERMAN ROUNDUP:
TOURISM will be hit by a rise in VAT from 16 to 19% on accommodation, restaurants and transport. Effective from 1st January, this will probably mean higher prices for our optionals. Supermarket goods will now be charged VAT at 7%.
TEMPLEHOF: The famous Airport just won’t go away. Despite plans to close it last year it still carried 500,000 of the 13 million air passengers to Berlin. Now a proposal from the Lauder Empire that employs 22,000 employees worldwide would see it used as a beauty centre keeping one runway open for the arrival of the jet-setters. Ronald Lauder, one of the major shareholders in Estee Lauder, is one of the most influential philanthropists of Jewish causes with a foundation that is sparking the revival of Jewish life in Central and Eastern Europe. The building 900 metres wide on the airside was built to carry 6 million people with a roof balcony that would hold 65,000 people to cheer the Fuehrer. The Berlin Government is desperately in debt and would love to find a use for the structure.
MADAME LE PRESIDENT? Members of the French Socialist Party voted for Segolene Royal as their candidate for the French Presidential elections on 22nd April. The question is what her title will be if she makes the top post - Madame Royal le President or la Presidente. The Academie Francaise says “le”, but she will be able to over-rule them and use “la” if she is elected.
HEADLIGHTS ON? Moves are underway to regularise the laws for car lights during daylight hours. When Sweden switched from driving on the left to the right of the road in 1975 there was a drop of 18% in the accident rate attributed to the requirement that all cars sold in Sweden would have lights illuminated as soon as the engine is started. Since then several other countries have brought in “Vehicle Lights on” regulations: All roads, all year: AUSTRIA, CZECH REPUBLIC, DENMARK, ESTONIA, FINLAND, LATVIA, NORWAY, SLOVENIA and SWEDEN Seasonal: LITHUANIA (November to March), POLAND (October to February), and SLOVAKIA (October to March) Others: ITALY and HUNGARY (Motorways and outside urban areas), PORTUGAL (where indicated, year round) In most cases an EU standard is accepted, but there are exceptions with Britain arguing that more motorcyclists will be involved in accidents because they generally (not a legal requirement) drive with headlights on. The British Government also claims that pollution will rise because of the extra power required! Although they claim a 13% rise, the EU says only 1.3% will result, as special lights, as used in other countries, do not require full headlamps and spotlights.
REMEMBER WHEN? Before the advent of the mobile phone we carried wads of phone cards from different countries and hated the lines of Italian students at the post office phone in Neuschwanstein. In Britain the first mobile phone call was made by Ernie Wise, the comedian, on 1st January, 1985. The first phone cost £ 2,000, was the size of a briefcase with a battery that failed after 20 minutes. The first text message was sent in 1993, while 140 million texts were sent on 1st July, 2006 when England was knocked out of the World Cup Football. All consuming in Britain - industry states 1,700 mobiles are thrown away every hour, one is stolen every 12 seconds and 90 million are lying around somewhere weighing about 11,250 tonnes.
WEATHER WATCH: As Global warming continues to hit the news, we will include odd titbits that come to light. A shipping warning has been issued as an iceberg has been spotted off the New Zealand coast near Dunedin. Probably a break away from a cracking of the Antarctic shelf, this is the first time since 1931 that an iceberg has been sighted off the NZ coast. Siberian bears are refusing to go into hibernation as the weather is still too warm. A shortage of food is bringing them closer to local communities. As the Cricketers prepare to battle for the Ashes, Australia has had unseasonable snow in Victoria and New South Wales, while Alice Springs has been subject to dust storms blowing at 90 km/hr and Brisbane was lashed by thunderstorms and hail. These “supercells” are common in the American Midwest but very rare in Australia. We keep hearing that we should cut flights and impose “green/carbon” taxes on airline tickets, but a new report says that if we were to turn off “standby facilities” on electrical equipment such as TV’s and video/music players we would be able to take as many flights as we liked without additional harm to the environment. Another reason for taxing us out of existence? Aviation in the EU accounts for 3% of greenhouse gases, road transport is 23% and power generation the highest producer. Rail lobbyists claim a train trip to the alps results in 5.7gm of CO2/km/person, while flights cause 180gm. The results of a recent survey at Stansted (London’s base for budget carriers) showed that the majority of passengers were bigger earners.
LEST WE FORGET 40 years ago storms hit Northern Italy, in two days the equivalent of a quarter of the regions annual rainfall fell. Landslides, floods and falling trees accounted for 10,000 flooded homes, while 50,000 farm animals and 112 people died. On 4th November 1966, Florence was engulfed by 600,000 tonnes of mud, rubble, sewage and oil, with the city’s heritage being damaged as 14,000 works of art and 3–4 million books were waterlogged. One of our Allied members, Walter Gelli from Walter’s Silver recounts standing in Piazza Santa Croce as a shocked population looked on silently, when a jeep from the US base at Camp Darby screeched into the square with a flag flying. Somehow the tension evaporated as if salvation had arrived. So many years later renovation still continues with accusations of not spending available funds efficiently. The storm drew intense desert winds into the Mediterranean, and sent waves crashing up the Adriatic. As usual Venice, lying at the far end bore the brunt and a record 1.94 metre flood overwhelmed the city. This marked the start of planning of defences, which have continued at a snails pace since. In August this year financial problems have caused more delays.
UNREAL ESTATE: For sale in Moscow – the 18th century Butyrka prison site of torture, beatings and death for 250 years. Well sited in the north of the city, the purchaser will have to build a new jail outside the metropolis.
DID YOU KNOW *It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open. *Our eyes are always the same size from birth, but our nose and ears never stop growing. *Babies are born without kneecaps. They don't appear until the child reaches 2 to 6 years of age. *Women blink nearly twice as much as men.
If you have any queries or would like further information; please contact us at:
 |
|
| © The British Region of IATM, 2008 | |